


Likely Acquaintances

by Bloopy42



Category: Twilight (Movies), Twilight Series - All Media Types, Twilight Series - Stephenie Meyer
Genre: A better love story, Aromantic, Canon Compliant, Developing Friendships, Drabble, Edward Cullen Bashing, Friendship, Gossip, High School, Implied Romance, One Shot, Romance, Sad Edward Cullen, Twilight Bashing, What-If
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-24
Updated: 2020-04-24
Packaged: 2021-03-02 02:26:55
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,926
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23827573
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bloopy42/pseuds/Bloopy42
Summary: Twilight is dumb for many reasons, one of them being that I was expected to believe that NO ONE even talked to the Cullens at school except Bella? It was high school! There had to be some social interaction! Especially poor lonesome Edward, who didn't come already partnered-up like the rest of the crew. Nope, I refuse to accept that he had zero amicable encounters.So, here's someone I wrote for him. One of those partial friendships that just happen naturally at school. If she read Twilight, she would also think it was dumb. But, like me, sometimes she just gets caught up thinking about it...
Relationships: Edward Cullen/Bella Swan, Edward Cullen/Original Female Character(s)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 136





	Likely Acquaintances

The Cullens transferred in tenth grade, when cliques had already been unceremoniously solidified and the battle for new blood had kids grinding their braces and stuffing their bras in the never-ending war for popularity. Introducing not one, but _five_ new possible recruits was like tossing a slice of ham into a tank full of piranhas. Forks High wasn’t typical, in the sense that its back didn't rest upon a history of jocks, nerds, pretty girls, and theater geeks that sparred in the hallways and cared what the other half thought. In fact, every cluster of miscellaneous friends that tolerated each other kept as unassuming and isolated as the tiny town was itself. That didn’t prevent the natural instincts that come with a high school biome from embedding in our systems. Everyone wanted to be liked. And the assemblies that won over were the ones that had the richest parents, the most attractive features, and the highest population density. Natural selection is a bitch.

So when the family of specimens, who looked like a bunch of 30 year-olds merely cast as teenagers in a crappy Disney drama, rolled up in their trust-fund-baby cars and sunglassed faces (despite the sky being a perpetual gray), I knew the gossip our developing brains had been craving had arrived.

The fight for their affection that first day was almost cinematic. Whispers by the lockers sounded like dialogue straight out of a Judy Blume novel. _Where do you think they’ll sit at lunch? Which one is the cutest? There’s no way they’re 16! Where are they from again?_

I only had to take one look at them before realizing all effort was lost before it had begun. A single new kid is one thing, but the Cullens had each other, and they were clearly in zero need of a gang of backwater Washington hicks to call their own. They sat together and alone in the cafeteria, huddled like bats at the table with no food, farthest from the bustling doors. A representative from different turfs stood and approached at calculated times throughout the period, as though collective appointments had been made. One by one, their invitations for the newbies to join was refused, and kids returned to their anxious friends empty handed.

“They’re not even eating,” said the crinkle-haired girl across from me. “Like, what the fuck?”

No one was hiding their stares. Not a single set of peepers in that large room were not fixated on the family, who, in the shadows, were incredibly pallid, their white skin popping like in a noir flick. Not even we could look away, two people who struggled to find just each other as freshmen and wouldn’t dare extend that amicability to a collection of strangers. We weren’t the only ones who thought we were above the competition for the Cullens’ friendship—the nice thing about Forks was that it was full of brooding souls, plenty of apathetic folk who snickered at how hard their peers were vying for new attention.

“Nora, let me tell you how this will play out,” I said as I bit into an apple and wiped my mouth with my sleeve. “Everyone will spend a few weeks busting their balls to try and win their favor. The more they’re ignored, the harder they’ll try. But, eventually, these weirdos will either pick new friends to sit with, or, they’ll just keep ignoring everyone until they graduate and people will lose interest.”

“Y’all seen anyone make any progress?” Our third counterpart, Alicia, slid her tray down. It was just the three of us. They say there’s strength in numbers, but I preferred good company. “Dang, I wish I was new. My parents just _had_ to move here for the start of high school, when every stinkin’ kid is new!”

“Aw, we had to win you over, didn’t we?” Nora smirked. We had grown up together in Forks, two of very few who had.

“I don’t recall you offering me your chocolate milk like I heard Grayson do that girl Alice,” but Alicia smiled back.

“No shit, did he really?” I almost choked. “That’s so…elementary.”

“School or simple?”

“Both.” We snorted for a hot second before returning the focus to the reality show unfolding. They had just finished their final rejection before standing up in perfect unison to leave. As if cued by their movements, the bell rang a millisecond after and the cafeteria erupted in its usual end-of-feast chaos. I managed to lock eyes with the auburn haired boy as we rose, who reminded me unflatteringly of Archie from the comics. My vision wasn’t great from across the swarming room, but in the next instant I could’ve sworn I caught him chuckling. It was the first time any one of the freaks had emoted all day. I covered my nose to feel if there was a laughable booger dangling from a nostril. Nothing. He had not been laughing at me, obviously.

It was a moment, though, that was such god-like foreshadowing to my next class. Neither of my two carefully selected friends were in chemistry with me, so I’d already banked on sitting alone. I chose a lab table in the back, where I could doodle undisturbed and scoot my chair as far back as I wanted. The class filled up quickly, because nobody wanted to be late for Mr. Turner. The guy was just really chill, and no one liked to let him down. That is, no one who wasn’t brand spanking _new_. Knock-off-Archie rolled in just before the bell, after all the seats had been filled. Except one.

He moved almost with lightning speed to the stool at my side, without even a sideways glance at me. All heads swiveled back to him. I even saw one girl in a mini skirt lean further along her table, revealing a buttcheek to the world and proving to me once again that thongs and pleats did not mix. Mr. Turner grinned from ear to ear as he came and rapped his knuckles on our lab table.

“Edward,” He said. “Welcome to Forks! And Chem honors. Blue can help catch you up, you’re only a few days behind in the trimester.”

“Thank you.” The guy spoke in a soft, gravelly voice that for some reason disconcerted me. It was a bedroom voice that so did not belong outside the bedroom, and yet there it was. In my Chemistry class. At my lab table.

“Okay, let’s get started!” Our teacher was already in his power stance back at the front of the classroom.”

I flipped open my textbook, slid it between myself and the perv, and jabbed my finger at the page number.

“So, yeah, we literally just started on effusion and diffusion—“ I started to whisper.

“You don’t need to help me. I can follow along.” He still wouldn’t look at me.

Well, didn’t need to tell me twice. I dragged my book back under my nose and tried not to glare while he got out his own. The boy was determined to sink or swim by his lonesome, what with his precious siblings unable to be constantly perched at his side like the cutesy wolf pack they’re portrayed themselves as earlier.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to be rude,” he suddenly added, almost inaudible. “It’s just…I’m really good at Chemistry.”

I let out a laugh that sounded more like a wheeze, and covered my mouth with prayer hands, praying that no one had heard. No one had. Praise be to Mr. Turner’s enrapturing teaching skills. Edward seemed taken aback that I’d thought his cockiness funny. It was the way he said it, like he was sincerely attempting a humble apology. But I learned quickly that the punk was not entirely devoid of a sense of humor when he cracked a smile and allowed himself one more purr.

“Fine. Don’t believe me.”

Turned out I didn’t have to. By the end of his first week, it was painfully obvious that he could have taught the entire curriculum himself while Mr. Turner sat in a corner with a gaping mouth. However, I could see him holding back. He raised his hand once per class, an extremely normal amount that must have been pre-calculated. Enough to be on the “good student” radar, but not enough to draw attention or reveal his secret identity as a whiz kid. I was the only one unfortunate enough to notice, as sitting next to him becoming increasingly more interesting than the lesson. So, I wasn’t as passive as I’d set out to be when it came to the Cullen boy. Sue me, new people were intriguing. The sociologist in my blood couldn’t help but study creatures that strayed from the norm. That, and I absolutely hated Chemistry.

I had no interest in being his friend. I was set in that department, and as I’d seen it was an endeavor in which one could waste copious amounts of energy and dignity. But, we got along. And it was a point of pride when the bell rang on his fifth day, he waited for me to pack my things.

“We need to work in pairs on this lab,” He said in his tight jawed manner, cavalierly waving the stapled packet we’d just been assigned in front of my face. “We should probably just work together. Right?” Was he nervous to ask _me_? We already sat next to each other, who the hell else would I have chosen?

“Uh, yeah?” I tried to force a kind tone. “Totally. We could knock it out after school if you’ve got time.”

“Sounds…good.” He sounded unsure.

I slung my backpack over one shoulder and pushed past him towards the door.

“We probably have an advantage,” I went on. I’d expected him to follow, to walk together in the hall as far as our paths went in the same direction. But the weirdo hung back and looked confused that I had initiated a longer conversation. I’d caught him unprepared. I wondered if he’d exchanged more than monosyllabic pleasantries with any students aside from his brothers and sisters since his arrival. Unfazed by impoliteness, I just turned back with squinted eyes and a look that said, _What? Follow at least some damn social norms!_ He accepted his fate and walked with me through the Chemistry door. I continued like nothing had happened. I wasn’t going to give him that satisfaction of acknowledging that he was a total outcast. A self-declared outcast, but one nonetheless. “You seem like you’ve taken this class, like, thirty times already. You just got a computer brain or a good tutor?”

“Ah…the latter. Definitely. My father didn’t want us to be too far behind, so he got us some extra help.”

“And now you’re ahead.”

We turned a corner to a row of lockers lined with students, each with a set of eyes that peeled to Edward as we passed like portraits in a haunted mansion.

“Not for long,” he replied, the attention not distracting him in the slightest. If it had been me versus that sea of stares, I would have run to the nearest bathroom. He seemed highly accustomed to it, his gaze glued straight ahead as if he were the only person in the hall. “We’re doing all things periodic table next unit. Not my forte.”

“I guess don’t knock it ‘til you try it,” I muttered, confused as to why anyone would take the time to look ahead at what we’d be learning next. Or perhaps, somehow, he’d just known. “This is me.” He’d actually walked me all the way to my next class. When he realized this, he visibly frowned. Then, gave me a stiff nod that would have been Bogart-esque if he had on a fedora. _Freak_. I didn’t like that word because of the way it had been exploited throughout history, but I really had no better word to describe him. And I really didn’t have the stamina to obsess over someone who extended so little effort to fitting in. It just wasn’t fair. The rules didn’t apply to the Cullens. They’d be loved for the sheer art of _not_ trying to be. Maybe it was just a beautiful person thing.

But our afterschool team-up in the library that cold Friday at least helped me come to a decision. I didn’t mind Edward.

“That’s wrong.” He already had his eraser coming towards my copy of the lab. I pulled it away.

“So _tell_ me, don’t just go changing shit to show off,” I snapped. “I’m never gonna learn if you do everything.”

“Sorry. I just need to get home soon.”

We’d only been working for twenty minutes and the guy was already fishing for sweet release.

“Ookay. We can just do this another ti—“ But that idea seemed to scare him more.

“It’s fine. We can finish.”

We bent our heads over our pages in unison, until a shadow loomed over our table. It was one of the volleyball players. Sam or Sara or something. She was a down to earth chick, but in our school hierarchy she was settled pretty high.

“Hey, Edward,” Sam-ara said, leaning her letterman jacket by our textbooks as a way of pulling rank. “We’re in first period English together, remember?”

“Yes.” His smile was thin-lipped.

“I just wanted to say, you know, if you ever needed a study buddy or someone to show you around, I’d be happy to, you know, be that person!” Study buddy was my least favorite rhyme scheme. This girl was sweet, but I knew her attempt was futile before she’d finished her sentence. Still, I was amazed the vultures had given him at least a few minutes alone in the library before swooping in. I wondered if my presence hindered his eligibility. I wasn’t disliked, but I also wasn’t cheer captain.

“Thank you. That’s very kind.” How Edward could be simultaneously rude and polite at the same time was infuriating.

She grinned and spared me a tiny wave. “Hey, Blue!”

“Hey.”

And then she was gone. That was how they did it, toss in a lure and hope the bait stuck. No one wanted to make a fool of themselves. Everyone wanted to be different, and in doing so be completely normal. It was a talented balance that some people achieved and others…

“Is Blue a nickname, by the way?” The first personal question to come out of the boy’s typically limited mouth. 

“No, actually. My given name. My parents are very crunchy that way. Are you already on question four?”

We worked in silence for a few more minutes before I felt curious enough.

“If we’d been in English together, you wouldn’t have even given me the time of day, would you?” I mused. “Science is like…you get stuck with people. You actually _have_ to socialize with your lab partner. It’s a forced alliance.”

He didn’t even look up.

“You are odd.” Edward kept scribbling.

“ _Me?”_ I didn’t suppress my laugh. “You’re the one who says words like ‘odd’, like you’re some British gentleman. And, I don’t know if you’ve seen any movies, but at this point the new kid is supposed to have made at least _one_ friend.”

“I’m not the friend-making type.” I’m sure he wanted this to sound far away and mysterious, but I just shrugged.

“Yeah. I guess if I grew up with four siblings I wouldn’t feel the need to go out of my way to meet new people. You’ve got a built-in clan.”

“I suppose”

 _I suppose_. Was he an undercover cop? He talked like a forty year old virgin.

He chuckled at nothing, then flipped the page of his textbook. Was the dick reading my mind? I always had this little paranoid fear that someone was listening in on my thoughts at the worst possible moments, and the irrational part of me didn’t put it past the psycho. I used to think Mr. Turner could read minds, the way he always called on me exactly when my brain had concluded I didn’t know the answer to his question. Oh, God. Maybe _I_ was the psycho.

“What did you say for two?” Edward asked abruptly, louder than I’d ever heard him speak.

“Ummmm,” I twisted my paper around for him to glance over. He nodded his approval at my work. “So…if you guys are all adopted, does that mean you can, like, date each other?” I didn’t feel the need to have a filter. I’d already stopped caring what he thought of me, and it was on to the interrogation.

“I…what?”

“Where’d you guys move from again? No, wait, better question, why Forks?” I pressed on.

“My father came for work…”

“What’s your mom do?”

“You know,” Edward leaned back in his chair with heavy eyes, as though announcing the end of the world. “The less you know about me the better. I’d like to be friends. Really, I would. But I can’t.”

“If I was trying to be your friend I wouldn’t be putting you on the stand,” I put the tip of my pencil against my lips. “If we have no future of a friendship, I’ve gotta find out what I can now, at the risk of being a nosy bitch. Your own damn fault for being all ‘enigmatic’.”

It earned me half a smile.

“I don’t mind talking to you,” He said, which surprised me. “But, to be candid, I prefer a low profile.”

“Join the club.”

“A club would defeat the purpose.”

I really tried not to roll my eyes.

“Oh, so he’s funny!” I announced. “Okay, hotshot. I won’t ask questions. You won’t either. I’ll be your minimum required social interaction for surviving high school, and we can part ways at graduation as likely acquaintances.”

He blinked. I was finally starting to say things he found quirky enough to entice him. 

“That...sounds good.”

It was not an arrangement I expected to continue, or even begin. I’d said it to be nice, but he took it to heart. I became the person to give Edward the school scuttlebutt when he came wondering, the designated non-sibling “study buddy”, the occasional hallway escort, and the buffer in the grade-wide war for his company. It was the first of many conversations with the kid.

* * *

**A month into sophomore year.**

He waited patiently for me to precariously stack my books in my rusting locker, the A we’d earned on our second Chem project sticking out of my textbook. When I shut my locker door, I found a second figure standing in my vicinity. She was at Edward’s shoulder, tapping it shly and tossing her sleek brown hair behind her shoulders with enviable grace. Her, I knew. Jessica Stanley. We had art together, and she sucked at it. I liked her. She was sarcastic and read Karl Marx.

“Oh, hey, Edward,” She said it as though he had been the one to approach her. “So, I’m on the homecoming committee this year and it’s been, heh, like pulling hair to get students registered to come. Are you and your brothers and sisters going? I’m sure if people hear _you’re_ going—“

“We’re not,” Edward replied flatly. When her face fell, he added, “We’re out of town that weekend.”

“Oh. Right. Well, maybe winter formal, huh?”

He just met her with a smile that looked painful on his stone face. Jessica gave me a real smile before darting off to avoid any further embarrassment. I let out a gust of air and shook my head.

“Damn, that was slick,” I said, leaning against my locker. “You should go with her. She’s the kind of girl that will let you into her pants after the dance.” He scrunched his face. He was not very into my vulgarity, which made him all the more untrustworthy.

“Are you going?” He asked. I so hoped he wasn’t about to profess his love for me.

“I’m DJ-ing,” I said. “Not something I’d normally do, but no one else volunteered and Jessica practically begged.” I was always chosen to lay down the soundtrack for our art classes.

“You’re a musician?” When Edward asked a personal question, it felt like uncharted territory.

“No, I just have good taste,” I smirked. “And, I mean, I guess I play a little piano.”

“Oh. I do, too.”

Of course he did. I could easily picture him sitting at a baby grand, seducing the women he brought back to his man cave with his talent, lulling them into a false sense of security with some Mozart before cutting their faces off and wearing them as masks. What? I tolerated the guy, but I was never going to get over the fact that he gave off serious serial killer vibes. 

I responded only with a little, “Hm.” He smiled his sad, stupid smile.

“You don’t like me very much.”

I raised my eyebrow.

“I thought you said you didn’t want anyone to like you. I’m just trying to be helpful.”

* * *

**First day of Junior year.**

It had happened again. The halls were abuzz with “new kid fever”, the Cullens long forgotten in the rat race. Up against a cute, doll-like girl from Arizona, they paled in comparison—pun intended. To up the ante, little miss sunshine was the police chief’s daughter, which made her an extremely worthy candidate for friendship and a _tres_ eligible bachelorette.

She was a fish out of water, though, and by the end of the lunch period she’d been scooped up quicker than a guppy in a cereal bowl. There would be no sitting alone for this gal, no brooding or purveying an air of mystery. She was desperate to rid herself of the new girl stink, like any normal person would. The battle for Bella Swan was swift and painless, her friends chosen by her cafeteria seating arrangements and her destiny set. That wouldn’t stop the talk, though. In a town where nothing ever happens, any shift in the tide was a topic worth dragging out for ages. And as much as I didn’t care, I cared. Especially when interest began to show in the one person I truly thought would never engage in curiosity.

“What do you know about the new girl?” Edward appeared at my locker as though out of thin air. After I got over the heart attack he damn near gave me, I shot him a testing glare.

“Hi yourself. Yes, I had a great summer, thank you for asking.”

“I’m sorry. Hello. How was your summer?”

I let out a satisfied laugh and slammed my locker shut to eye the kid up and down. He literally had not changed one hair since the end of the last trimester, like he was frozen in time. I backtracked to his initial question.

“What do I know, huh? Same things everyone else does. Haven’t you been keeping up?” I found it funny he was asking me instead of spending a few quiet moments eavesdropping in the boys’ locker room. “Moved from Arizona. Chief Swan is her old man. Almost as white as your ass. Completely underwhelming.”

“But she’s…there’s something different about her.” He was frowning and it was weird.

“Oh shit, you’re into her, too?” I almost did a spit take. It made sense. She was exactly his type. Hot.

“Absolutely not.”

I tried to look warmer.

“I’ve got calc with her. She’s very approachable, you should just talk to her,” I said in my most motherly voice.

“Forget I said anything,” He turned and

“What? Come on, don’t leave me high and dry.” I followed him, pressing my books against my boobs as if it would give me the speed I needed to keep pace. “What do you like about her?”

“I _do not_ like her. That’s precisely it. I can’t get a read on her,” He said under his breath.

“Ha. But that’s why everyone likes _you_ , isn’t it?”

He fell silent.

“I know why you like her,” I continued when he didn’t make his escape. “She’s a blank slate. You can project anything you want onto her because you don’t know what she’s thinking. And, usually with girls like that, they’re not thinking much.” I didn’t _hate_ this girl I barely knew, but after one class I’d learned her favorite book of all time was _Wuthering Heights_ , she hadn’t thought about college whatsoever, and she shampooed with Pantene. And this was in a _math_ class that these factoids came up, mind you.

“I didn’t mean for this to turn into a lengthy discussion. I just wanted to try joining the public conversation for once,” but I thought I saw him return my teasing smile.

“Consider it joined. You’ve done your teenage duty.” We paused outside the door to his next class. “It’s gonna be super nice tomorrow. Your parents taking you guys out of town again?” Usually, talking about the weather wasn’t my favorite method of small talk. But I’d noticed it meant something different to Edward.

“Most likely. Being the son of a doctor means vitamin D absorption is as vital as eating your vegetables.”

“The fact that you can get away with hooky shows some serious privilege.”

“Trust me, I’d rather be at school.”

I almost believed him.

“Sucks we don’t have bio together. The dream science team has been dissolved,” I sighed as dramatically as I could.

This time, he full on grinned with teeth white as pearls and just as rare.

“And yet you’re still talking to me.”

* * *

**Junior Prom.**

It was the punch table of all places that he came to stand beside me. Though, to be honest, I’d stuck as close to the snacks that night as I should have to my date, if I’d had one. If he had been trying to locate me, which I very much doubted, it would not have been difficult. The sound of my munching would’ve been heard all the way out to the gazebo. He started filling two glasses before he opened his mouth, but I never liked allowing him the first word. Or the last.

“Wow, Edward Cullen at a school function? Hath hell frozen over?” Yikes. Maybe that was why I didn’t have a date. But he smiled politely. It had become his default expression. If he could be summed up in one mouth position it would be a creaky, convivial twist of smile that would have fit well on a Michelangelo statue that had endured years of acid rain.

“I wanted Bella to enjoy the night,” Edward shrugged with only one shoulder. “You only get one Junior Prom.”

“And only one Senior Prom which is exactly the same event, just a year later.”

“You didn’t want to dance with Joey Spovick? I saw him ask earlier.” The snoop. How he had eyes at the punch table and on his crippled girlfriend was a disconcerting talent.

“Nora likes him. I sent him her way.”

“That was kind of you.”

“No, he just smells god awful.”

He had finished pouring the second glass, balancing both drinks with ease. I wondered if he was taking his time to avoid being rude, or if he was trying to fill his social quota. Using me as the other person at the party to talk to that wasn’t his girlfriend in order to appear more normal. He affirmed this by handing me one of the punch glasses in his grip. I took it, but smirked.

“What about Bella?”

“This one’s for her,” He raised his other occupied hand.

“What about you?”

“Not thirsty.”

“Not after all that hardcore dancing to Iron and Wine?” I chugged the pink liquid in two gulps.

He licked his lips and chuckled. He never outright laughed, it was always a chuckle.

“I’m not the one with a broken leg,” He said, and I followed his eyes to the row of benches in the far end of the room where Bella sat with two of her friends. Her foot up to her calf had on a black brace, making her look slightly more robotic than she already was.

“Fuuuck, yeah, what happened to her? Everyone’s speculating, but I think she’s been giving out different stories.” I had to give her credit, the girl was a good secret keeper.

“Accident,” said Edward shortly.

“Oh, well, good. I would have been worried if she’d intentionally inflicted this upon herself.”

That made him uncomfortable.

“Enjoy your night, Blue.” Damn. He’d had the last word.

* * *

**Senior year.**

We were packing up after AP English, the second and last class Edward Cullen and I would ever have together. We’d just finished our discussion of _The Picture of Dorian Gray_ , which I’d really only skimmed. With books, once you get the idea, the rest of your effort just becomes about picking out a line or two you can discuss in class or bring up at a dinner party. I was ready to never think about Oscar Wilde again, but Edward was suffering from intellectual deprivation and turned to me at his desk to strike up an ethical conversation.

“Do you think it’s selfish to want to live forever?” He asked abruptly, and I noticed we were the only two left in the classroom.

“Uh…Did Dorian not give you enough closure on that one?”

“Just hoping you could settle a... debate I’ve been having with a certain significant other.” Ooh. Now that was juicy.

“Well,” I zipped up my backpack slowly. “I think that depends on motive, right? Or like, what you would _do_ with all that extra time.”

“What about for love?” Ew. Was this the kind of pillow talk these kids engaged in?

“Depends on the love.”

“How do you mean?”

He was really grilling me. We stood up at the same time.

“Well,” I said again. “Romantic love grows stale over time. It’s a fire that kind of dies down into either nothing or a placated and platonic love, like one you’d have for family or friends.”

“How would you know that?”

“Just my observation. And, I don’t know, if it were me I wouldn’t choose to be immortal just to be with someone else. I’d want to be immortal for _me_. So that I could do and see everything. And, maybe, if I felt like it down the line, cure cancer.”

“So…is it selfish?”

I sighed and pushed the door into the hallway. It was only then that I realized Edward rarely sighed. Like, actually let out a gust of air just to cleanse his lungs like the rest of us.

“You say selfish like it’s a bad thing. It’s selfish to want to survive at all, so, yes, ultimately, it _is_ selfish to want to survive forever. But who _wouldn’t_ want to? It’s human nature. Does that make it wrong?”

“I don’t know. Would _you_ want to?”

“You offering?” I laughed, but his face hardened. “I…uh…I don’t know. Hell, it would sure make all these stupid moments my life has been made up of so far seem so much less special. Huh,” I picked at a loose seam on my backpack strap. “I think I’d have to live a hundred years first before I decided.”

“Wouldn’t that be lucky,” He replied sardonically.

“What about you?” I asked. Edward leaned against the wall, something I’d never seen him do before.

“I wouldn’t,” He said simply.

“Oh. Got it. Now I know which side of the argument you were on,” I grinned. “So, why?”

He gave me a quick look that plainly read, _You wouldn’t understand_ , a look that was so revolting it made me want to upchuck in his face.

“It’s…depressing. And unfair. Living forever while everyone and everything around you gets to change and die and make room for new people and ideas? While you’re stuck feeling like every day is unimportant and your existence is meaningless sorely because it is never ending? One would go insane.”

“I feel like being immortal is a learning curve,” I chewed thoughtfully on the inside of my lip. “The first hundred years is one life lived. You spend the next wondering what the hell to do with yourself, realizing that you can’t love people because you’ll have to watch them disappear—unless they’re immortal too, in which case, you might just get sick of them—but then those hundred years _after_ , you start to understand that it’s an opportunity to keep learning. Because if everything changes so constantly, the only one who could stay on top of it all is someone who’s seen it all.”

“But having seen it all means life becomes trite.”

“No, dummy, that’s what I’m trying to say!” I let my eyes roll this time. I wasn’t explaining it right. “There’s no such thing as ‘seeing it all’. It all keeps changing. And you keep learning. And the wider your history becomes the more useful you’ll be in the future. Re: curing cancer.”

Edward looked at me for a long time. I knew he wasn’t trying to figure out what to say, since he always knew what to day, rather trying to decide whether or not to say it.

“You should write all that for your final essay,” He began to stalk away.

“Glad I could help with your relationship problems,” I called after him.

He turned back and assured me with the corners of his lips pulled up and taut.

“You didn’t.”

* * *

**Graduation.**

He sought me out after it was all over. Affection, I would have guessed, was not his forte but he bestowed upon me a hug before I could register it was happening. Bella must have softened him. And, everyone was hugging. Many of us would never see each other again, so the least we could do was imprint ourselves in touch-memory so as not to be forgotten. At least, at first.

“Hey,” I snorted after he pulled away and looked down at me with his unfitting grin. “Congrats! We damn did it.”

“And to you,” Edward said like we were in church, but he was elated as if he had just been married. He hadn’t seemed excited up on stage, but perhaps now that it was over he was relishing. Or, maybe Bella had put out. Or maybe his parents had gotten him a new car for graduation, a golden Volvo this time. I still didn’t know what made the guy tick. “I wanted to say goodbye. And good luck at Swarthmore.”

“Thanks, man,” I said, and I meant it. “Still don’t know where you’re going?”

“Bella and I have some thinking to do on our gap year.” They were trying to stay together, go to the same college perhaps. It was actually pretty cute. They wouldn’t last.

“That’s great,” I smiled. “Well, uh, you know. Stay out of trouble. Or don’t. I don’t really care.”

A genuine laugh erupted from him.

“I almost wish you had liked me more,” He twirled his cap impressively in the air.

“Nah, you don’t.”

Then, Edward did stuck out his hand all official-like as though we were about to foreclose a house.

“Likely acquaintances, then?” He said. He’d remembered, the freak. I took it and squeezed. His hands were fucking freezing, and I almost wanted to tell him to see a doctor about his circulation, but he was his own problem now.

“Likely acquaintances,” I agreed.

We parted ways, just as I’d predicted. The most important thing being that I had finally had the last word.


End file.
